Hey, I just went on a typical American vacation. YOu know, one of those one week, plus two weekends flying tours, not those the socialistic European six week deals. I come back and there are questions about America falling apart? Under the Bush administration? What is this, some kind of un-American attitude? Now I will admit, my vacation was a short one, compared to European-style holidays. But I didn’t want any of that European socialist stuff. I wanted to visit my friend who works at Niagrara Mohawk Power, you know, the electric utility that serves 1.5 million New Yorkers. His wife works at the Casual Corner Dress shop. To finance the trip I went to Household Finance and took out a small loan. With money in my jeans I drove my Chrysler Sebring to Jiffy Lube for an oil change, fill the tank at my local Amoco- slip a Dave Matthews CD in the stereo, stop at Dunkin’ Donuts and have a donuts with my Slim Fast—and hit the road. I wanted to drive straight through, so I had packed several flavors of Snapple and snacked on Baby Ruth, Power Bars, a couple of Miller Lite’s for the evening and even a can of Alpo for my pooch.

So I drove till I hit the Holiday Inn, having stopped only at a Texaco, smoking my Lucky strikes, sometimes sipping on a 7UP. When my mouth got a little bird-cagey I chewed Bazooka bubble gum. I called my buddy on my Nokia and Verizon made instant contact. I adjusted my Ray-Bans and loosened my Brooks Brothers tie and thought about the Lean Cuisine frozen in my ice-chest and the Ben & Jerry’s for dessert. I am getting tired of driving and really looking forward to spending time with my morning Chicago Sun-Times I just bought at the Stop & Shop with my Dr. Peppers. On the way home I plan on stopping at that Travelodge and checking out Russell Crowe’s “A Beautiful Mind” on the pay-per-view.

Hey, how can you even suggest America is falling apart? Oh, every product I bought or used on my trip came from European owned companies. Household Finance is a branch of British banking’s HSBC; my Chrysler Sebring is Germany’s Daimler Chrysler; Amoco is Brit owned by BP; Shell and Texaco by Netherlands owned Royal Dutch Shell; Jiffy Lube is also Dutch owned; the Dave Matthews label is owned by German publishing’s Bertelsmann; Dunkin’ Donuts is Brits Allied Domecq; my Slim-Fast from Dutch-British Unilever; Baby Ruth and my dog’s Alpo by the Swiss Nestle’ ; my snapple came from Cadbury-Schweppes, Lucky Strikes from Brit owned American Tobacco; and my Bazooka gum is Schweppes; and my Miller’s Lite is SAB a British company; my Verizon service is part of British Vodafone: my Holiday Inn belongs to London’s Six Continents; my Ray-Ban’s Italy’s Luxottica, SPA and the Brooks Bros. Italy’s Retail Brand Alliamce; the Lean Cuisine Nestle, and the Ben & Jerry’s Unilever; Russell Crowe is Australian; his academy award winning movie by French Vivendi as is most pay-per-view.

How can you even think America is falling apart? Why just read the Chicago Sun-Times (owned by London’s Conrad Black) and you will realize America falling apart would destroy Europe.

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